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We’re in the Midst of a Horror Comedy Renaissance — Why Now?

Horror comedies are seeing a sharp upswing — but why do we need them?

By Ellery Weil

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Published on March 23, 2026

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A shiver down your spine… a giggle in your throat? Horror comedy may sound like a contradiction, but the genre is nothing new. In fact, some consider One Exciting Night, a film released in 1922, to be the first-ever horror comedy film. Other early examples of the genre include Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, a 1948 film that took a very straightforward approach to horror comedy by literally introducing a monster to a comedy duo. But horror comedy is no relic of the past—in fact, it seems to be everywhere these days. The only issue is, has anyone noticed?

At the 2026 Academy Awards, four Oscars, including for Best Screenplay and Best Actor, went to the decadent Sinners, which can be fairly argued to be a horror comedy (and a costume drama, and a musical—it’s a very cross-genre film, which is part of its charm). Also in 2025 came winking killer-robot flicks Companion and M3gan 2.0. In 2026, the Scream movies are back yet again, while the delightfully campy Ready or Not (basic premise: what if the Parker Brothers, as in the board games, were a large family instead of a pair of brothers, and also in league with the devil) has an even campier sequel. Clearly, there’s a hearty appetite out there for horror comedy. But why?

Well, maybe we all need an escape. We live in tempestuous times, and the gleeful excesses of horror comedy can let us forget that for a little while. Escapism is underrated, but powerful. In a college writing class, one question we were asked to grapple with was the purpose of fiction “beyond simple escapism.” Even then, the phrase struck me. Beyond? Simple? Escapism is vital; it wouldn’t be a tradition that spans all the way back to Homer if it wasn’t (and frankly, The Odyssey could definitely be played for horror comedy in bits, especially the parts about Circe and the animal transformations).

It’s also difficult to do well. Watching some of the lower-budget 80s horror comedies, or Messrs. Abbott and Costello introducing themselves to yet another member of the Spirit Halloween Gang, it’s easy for your mind to wander. One reason I, at least, had such a good time watching Sinners was that, for the full two hours and seventeen minutes of its runtime, I wasn’t thinking of anything but these musicians and vampires in 1920s Mississippi. When Ready or Not premiered in theaters, I didn’t get around to it on the big screen—but watching it during a long flight, after an exhausting drag to the airport, I found myself captivated.

Why is the horror comedy renaissance happening? Maybe we should be asking—why does it matter? Because it does matter. And it matters because, even as a genre that’s been belittled, and associated with corny gags and buckets of red corn syrup “blood”, horror comedy can be art. And when it is art, when the formula works, between the screams and the laughs and the gasps, it’s breathtaking.

But maybe there’s a little more going on than that. To understand the current horror comedy renaissance, maybe you have to look at the appeal, more broadly, of horror comedy as a genre. While horror movies can provide things like social commentary and a way to reflect on our feelings, they can also serve another, equally important purpose: catharsis. 

The word catharsis comes from two Greek words; katharos, meaning “pure” or “clean,” and kathairein, meaning to purge, or purify. In ancient Greece, theatres were found next to temples because attending the theatre was considered a holy thing, in part because the emotional catharsis experienced by the audience was considered a form of purification, which Aristotle described in Poetics, praising the “purging of emotions” theatre could enable. Horror movies provide that same catharsis, a way of letting out shock and fear, and that same sense of relief when the film ends and the lights go up.

Horror comedy, meanwhile, takes that feeling and doubles, or possibly even squares it. The ancient Greek theatre was famous for its tragedy, but also for its comedy, and the emotional catharsis provided by “a good cry” or getting your socks scared off you can also be felt by the kind of laughter that makes your stomach ache. 

Horror comedy as a genre arguably predates horror comedy movies at all. Before there were films, or even cameras, there was theatre. And in theatre, there was horror, comedy, and horror comedy. In Paris, when the Théâtre du Grand-Guignol opened in 1897, they ran programs of double features, where over-the-top gore in the horror plays alternated with comedy shows, for an effect the theatre owners likened to bathing in hot and cold water. A visit to the Grand-Guignol could even be followed up with a glass of wine at a horror comedy restaurant, the Cabaret de L’Enfer, a Parisian hell-themed establishment that had guests enter through the mouth of a demon, only to be mocked by waiters dressed as devils who called coffee “molten sin.”

It was certainly a memorable way to spend a night on the town. And it definitely didn’t leave you feeling underwhelmed. 

Horror comedy may be the ultimate cathartic film genre, satisfying some of our most intense emotional impulses, and, when done well, leaving the audience with a satisfaction that’s almost like physical exhaustion from a good workout. There’s even a third layer, which comes from the element of surprise—you don’t expect to laugh at the monster, or be frightened of the jokes, so when it happens, it has an extra punch.

Are people in any particular need of catharsis right now? Oh yes. Whatever your take on the current state of the world, it’s inescapable to note that times are tense. The heyday of the Grand-Guignol and the Cabaret de L’Enfer was a tense time too; these thrived in the leadup to World War I and in interwar years, as the world held its breath in the uneasy armistice, and as technology changed the landscape at an increasingly rapid pace. This may also be a reason that the 1980s saw an absolute outpouring of horror comedy—the height of the Cold War was another decidedly tense era. To scream, to laugh, to be transported—all of these are a release of tension.

The Grand-Guignol closed in the early 1960s; the owners believed that witnessing the real horrors of the Holocaust had diminished public appetite for horror theatre. The postwar years in America saw horror comedy relegated to Abbott and Costello meeting an increasingly unlikely cast of classic movie monsters, the far end of the “silly and scary” scale. It would be over a decade before the genre picked back up; in the immediate postwar years, an era where everyone was already exhausted from the hard-won end of the war, people simply didn’t need it.

As the Cold War tensions grew higher, the need returned. The 1980s were, in some ways, the golden age of an especially lurid, throw-your-popcorn-over-your-shoulder school of horror comedy, although the form had started in the 60s and 70s. Think Little Shop of Horrors—the original movie, not the movie musical, where there’s far less singing, more chomping, and a much darker ending.

Today’s tense era is one where, at least in theory, we have more ways to vent and experience catharsis than ever before. Anyone who’s ever done time on a microblogging platform knows that getting into a low-stakes fight online is about as easy as falling off a log. But in a world of social media catharsis, which is fostered on mutual exchange (“like, comment, and subscribe!”), and live events which proudly, and sometimes erroneously, bill themselves as “immersive,” watching a film asks less of you. No one expects you to contribute to the experience; you’re doing your job by sitting and watching and screaming and laughing.

And that’s just it—we are doing our job. The films keep getting made because we keep watching. Because like Aristotle looking to purge his emotions, we need this. We need the human experience of sitting, all of us alone together in the dark, with the screen illuminating our faces as our expressions shift from fear to glee. Amidst the ambient chaos that is being a person in 2026, we need a chance to laugh, and scream, and escape. And then the lights go on, and we stand up, feeling lighter, and having been purified.[end-mark]

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